She came apart with a sharp gasp, her fingernails digging into his sides as she went rigid underneath him with her climax.
Maybe he would have been able to last longer if he hadn’t had the nightmare. If her cries of completion hadn’t been the proof he needed to fully believe she was truly there with him, alive and unharmed, maybe he could have gone on like that in her warmth just a little while longer.
But as it was, he didn’t want to be away from her. Not even in this. His head lifted from her chest and he erupted, once again filling her with his seed, so much so that he could feel the hot, slick action on his own shaft as he emptied out inside of her.
When he fell back on top of her, he was once again shuddering, but this time not because of any nightmare.
This time it was because of a dream come true.
“Zhena…” he said, kissing her neck. “Moya zhena…”
27
“Jenna,” Nikolai said against her neck. Sam stiffened, her eyes flying open. Who was Jenna? And why was he calling her by another woman’s name?
But then he kissed her neck. And said, “Moya Jenna.”
No, not a name, she realized. Russian, he was speaking to her in Russian.
She opened her mouth to ask him what “jenna” meant, only to have it seized again. But this time his kiss wasn’t desperate or harsh, like the one that had shocked the hell out of her earlier. This one was a soft exploration, almost as if he were trying to get to know her better through her lips.
The kiss made her feel like she was in high school again, tentatively leaning forward to surprise her AP Chemistry lab partner, Anthony Collison, with a kiss the bespectacled black nerd hadn’t been expecting. Nikolai’s kiss made her feel like she had back then, when she truly believed something beautiful might be waiting on the other of all the ugliness at home.
Hopeful. That’s how Nikolai’s kiss made her feel.
At least for a second or two. Then her stepfather’s slurred voice broke through her afterglow. “You think that boy’s in love with you? Check your damn head, girl. He using you for that ass,” he said when she announced she’d be moving in with Anthony. “He want to put that ass on tap!”
Nikolai finished the kiss with a satisfied smile. There was no trace of the man who’d shaken in her arms, helpless shudders racking his entire body.
“Thank you,” he said, his voice low. “For helping me with nightmare.”
He sat up. “Pavel will be up soon, but after he goes to school…” He gave her knowing look. “We do this again, da?”
“You’re just a piece of ass, far as any of these boys concerned, and that’s all you ever going to be to them,” her stepfather said inside her head. It had been the last thing he’d said to her before she moved out.
Shame, ugly and hot, rolled her stomach.
Nikolai frowned at her. “You have morning sickness again?”
“No,” she answered, rubbing a hand over her aching chest. “I… it’s just…” With shaking hands, she pulled her college sweatshirt back down over her breasts and climbed out of bed.
“You’re right,” she said, tugging on the sweatshirt and wishing it were a few inches longer so it could cover her naked bottom. “I- I should get up. G-get myself ready. M-make Pavel breakfast.”
Nikolai regarded her from underneath his hooded stare. “You have much trouble speaking sometimes after we kiss. You are like woman from kind of film—you know, kind of movie where woman falls in love with man and then trips and falls down many times. How do you say that kind of movie?”
“Romantic comedies,” she mumbled, pulling on the sweatpants she found discarded next to the bed as fast as she could. “Rom coms.”
“Yes, rom coms,” he said from the bed. “You have trouble with your words like those women. Why?”
“Probably because I haven’t had my coffee yet,” she answered, keeping her eyes down as she headed toward the bathroom.
“Or maybe it is because… zhena, turn around. Look at me.”
There was that name again. But this time she heard the nuance. A zh sound, not a J. What did it mean? she wondered as she turned to look back at him.
Which was a total mistake. All the breath left her body. There was sexy, and then there was Nikolai Rustanov sitting on top of that big bed of his. His hair tousled on top of his head, his chiseled chest on full display, his legs spread apart so you’d have to be blind as Beau not to notice the large erection in between his legs. Standing at attention, and still glistening from having been inside her.
Despite the pounding it had already received that morning, her sex throbbed in response to the sight of him. She refocused on his overly handsome, but not nearly as discomfiting, face and waited for him to say whatever he wanted to say.
But he didn’t speak for a few long seconds, just stared, his eyelids so heavy they verged on dangerous, even though he was technically smiling. Technically. The sides of his mouth were quirked up, so she guessed that counted.
“I make you nervous,” he finally finished, scanning her body with smirking assessment.
“Ya think?” she answered in her best Captain Obvious voice. “I mean, you’ve got the muscles, the looks, and the, you know…” she circled her hand around her face. “The whole dead-eyed stare thing going. I think you make a lot of people nervous. On purpose.”
His gaze shifted to the side as if he was giving her words careful consideration. “Yes, I often make women nervous.” His eyes came back to her. “But I do not want to make you nervous, zhena. That is not what I want to do with you.”
More staring.
And Sam’s heart actually skipped a few beats, her own gaze hopelessly locked onto his. To the point that it felt like he was letting her go when he finally broke the stare off with a stretch of his heavily muscled arms.
“I will take my exercise, and you can take shower.” He smirked at her. “But zhena, do not fall like woman in rom com. This could hurt our baby.”
“I’ll try to stay upright,” was the best she could come up with under the him-very-naked-on-the-bed circumstances.
She disappeared into the bathroom for a long shower and pondered his parting words, “Do not fall...” Sam was fairly certain he meant it literally. But she chose to read between the lines. Do not fall… in love. Especially not with him.
And as she washed him off her body, she was haunted once again by a remembered conversation, this one much more recent, having only taken place less than two months ago.
“Love. Love is a silly custom you don’t believe in? You seriously just said that? How can you not believe in love?”
“Trust me, you do not have to believe in silly custom to give woman much pleasure. Come upstairs. I will show you.”
And show her, he had. Twice.
LUCKILY THERE WAS NOTHING like a hectic morning of getting a little boy through his yoga practice and off to school, followed by an oh-so-sexy bout of depositing the rich food she’d eaten at her wedding dinner into one of the downstairs toilets, to clear her mind. By the time she got over the dry heaves enough to drive herself to work, she was more than ready to think about anything other than Nikolai Rustanov and the morning sickness-inducing baby he’d put inside of her, courtesy of the last time she’d let a kiss with him go too far.
However, her Don’t Think About Nikolai plan hit a bump soon after she arrived at Ruth’s House. An Asian man was waiting on the front steps, a very handsome Asian man in an expensive-looking suit.
Sam was perplexed. He looked way too wealthy to be a social worker and way too classy to be a lawyer. And she seriously doubted he was the abusive husband or boyfriend of one of the women at the shelter. Not that Asians were immune to abusive relationships, but in her many years of working with abused women, she’d discovered some cultures were simply more private about their relationship troubles than others and, as a result, a lot less likely to call attention to themselves when the shit hit the fan.
“Hello?” It came out more a questi
on than a greeting.
“Hello,” he replied, coming down the steps to meet her on the sidewalk. Upon closer inspection, she was pretty sure his suit had been hand tailored to his body’s specifications. And he walked with a slight limp. An old injury, she guessed, one that for whatever reason hadn’t set right.
“I’m Suro Nakamura,” he said with a bow. Unlike Nikolai, he spoke perfect English with only the slightest accent to indicate he wasn’t from the States. He came to a stop a few feet beside her, turning his body sideways between the house and the road so she was forced to do the same if she wanted to address him.
“Okay, Mr. Nakamura,” she said, feeling all sorts of unsettled as she noticed how his eyes did a continuous slow back and forth between the house and road, like a tracking light scanning the perimeter. “What can I help you with?”
Suro arched an eyebrow at her. “This is actually about how I can help you. I’m here in regards to your security needs.”
“Oh,” she said, her mouth falling open with surprise. “You’re here about the security guard position?”
She could hear the skepticism in her voice and she didn’t want to be rude, but this guy looked nothing like the usual rent-a-cops she’d met before. He didn’t have the build of an ex-high school football player whose muscle had turned mostly to fat. And he was simply too young to be a retired police officer like Danny had been.
An aura of cool remove surrounded him, one that put her in mind of—well, of Nikolai. Nikolai at his worst, when he was doing his “no feelings, no feelings at all” thing.
“I thought the agency wouldn’t be sending anyone over until tomorrow,” she said.
“I’m not here with an agency, but as a favor to Nikolai Rustanov.”
She cocked her head to the side. “Nikolai sent you?”
“Yes, he’s asked me to assess your security needs, so I’ll need to take a look around your shelter.”
“I don’t think so,” she said, her brain still trying to catch up with the fact that Nikolai had sent someone to her shelter to assess her security needs, like… like he had anything to say about it. “First of all men aren’t allowed in the shelter and second of all, I think your suit might cost more than we normally pay our guards in a year. As capable as I’m sure you are, we can’t afford you.”
A slight smile turned up the corners of his mouth as he conceded, “No, you probably cannot. But I won’t be the one serving your needs, only finding four men who can.”
She blinked. “Four men?” she repeated. Ruth’s House had never had more than one day or night guard on duty at any given time.
“Mr. Rustanov was very clear about wanting your shelter to have twenty-four hour protection. Front and back.”
“Yes, but… we get by with what we already have. And twenty-four hour security protection isn’t exactly in the budget.”
“Consider it a gift from Mr. Rustanov. A security endowment.”
Sam opened her mouth. Then closed it. Then opened it again. Then closed it, truly frustrated because… yeah, it was a gift she hadn’t asked for and no, she didn’t like having decisions forced upon her.
But unfortunately, Nikolai had hit her right in her weak spot. She didn’t want to give in, but she had a duty to her shelter. If anyone else had given them a “security endowment,” she would have thanked them with a handwritten letter, then again in person with a plaque, and then yet again with a mention in their bi-annual donor newsletter.
She also would have called Josie in a fit of delight to tell her the good news. The only reason she didn’t now, and knew she wouldn’t later, was because this generous gift came via Nikolai Rustanov, who was apparently trying to—actually she wasn’t quite sure what he was trying to do with this extreme gesture.
“May I show you something?” Suro asked, interrupting her conflicted thoughts. His face had gentled, she noticed. Less all-business mode, and more sensitivity than she would have guessed him capable of possessing at first sight.
He pulled out his phone and came to stand beside her. Then he swiped a picture on to the phone’s rectangular screen. A little girl with creamy brown skin, a bubbly expression and chubby legs and cheeks appeared. She looked to be about two, on the thin edge between baby and toddler, and she was nothing less than completely adorable.
“This is my daughter, Gracie,” Suro said with a smile in his voice. He swiped the screen again to the picture of a little black boy. This one was definitely a toddler, standing up strong and confident with a dinosaur toy raised above his head. “And this is our adopted son, Spidey.”
Before Sam could ask if he’d really named his adopted child, Spidey, Suro swiped again. This time to a picture of two young teenagers, one Asian, one black, sitting at a piano together with intent expressions on their faces. “We call these two the twins, but they’re technically my son and stepdaughter. They formally introduced me to my wife.”
He swiped the phone to reveal one last picture: a pretty woman with dreadlocks, smiling sleepily up at the camera as a newborn Gracie slept on top of her, her small head nestled into the woman’s shoulder. “And this is my wife, Tasha.”
He gave the picture a thoughtful smile before tucking the phone back in his inside pocket. “I’d do anything to keep my family safe and if Tasha were working at a place like this, I’d make sure she had security I could trust. Let Mr. Rustanov do this for you.”
The slideshow had been cute. Too cute. It had left a sweet ache in Sam’s heart that made her rub a hand over her chest for the second time that morning.
Suro was probably right about Nikolai doing this because he wanted to protect his family. But he was wrong about Nikolai doing it for her. He’d hired a security guard for Pavel, and she supposed this was his way of making sure the baby inside her womb received the same standard of protection.
Nonetheless, the fact remained: she’d be an idiot to turn down such a gift. She’d always put the Ruth’s House shelters first, and she was prepared to downshift her pride if it meant the women who came to her would benefit from Nikolai’s commitment to providing security for their baby.
She forced a smile onto her face and asked Suro, “Since we’re going all out on security, do you think it’s possible to get four women guards in here? I’ve been asking the agency we use here and in Alabama to provide us with women for years now, but it’s kind of a “take what you can get situation” at the wages we’ve been paying.”
Suro nodded, family man gone and all business now that she had agreed to let him assess Ruth’s House Indiana’s security needs.
“I’m sure that can be arranged,” he answered.
28
“Can you pass me the salt, Pavel?”
Nikolai watched his nephew pass his wife the salt shaker sitting in front of his own plate. So close, in fact, that the obvious thing would have been for her to ask Nikolai for the salt. But his wife had been using Pavel as a go-between all night. In fact, she hadn’t said a word to Nikolai, beyond hello, since he walked in the door.
Nikolai added a bit of pepper to the lemon chicken his wife had made with a tight jaw. It was Monday, technically the night after their disastrous wedding dinner, but despite what had taken place between he and his wife that morning, nothing had changed. She barely looked at him throughout the meal. And just like every other night they’d had dinner together so far, she and Pavel did most of the talking, leaving him to sit there with a strange emptiness in his stomach, wondering if he’d ever be able to do the things that came to her and Pavel so naturally. Wondering if he’d ever be able to act like he was a member of a normal family.
If Pavel had wanted to talk about the best gun for killing a man quietly, Nikolai could have held forth on that topic all night. But for most of the meal, his nephew and his wife talked about some TV series that sounded both inane and complicated. A show called Avatar, which Pavel loved, even though it wasn’t based in any way whatsoever on the James Cameron movie of the same name. At least not so far as Nikolai could
tell.
In any case, his wife and nephew had yet to choose a topic he could feel comfortable talking about. But he was no longer a little boy, forced to exist on the periphery of the Rustanov family, he reminded himself.
His father was dead. And his Russian relatives for the most part were proud to have a famous hockey player in their family tree now. He had a big house and more money than he knew what to do with. He owned a professional hockey team, he thought to himself, biting down fiercely on a piece of chicken. He refused to be intimidated by the small talk of one small woman and one even smaller boy. Also, he’d be damned if he was going to let Samantha avoid him by talking to Pavel all night.
When their conversation about the boy avatar versus the girl avatar came to a close, he forced himself to jump in.
“Pavel, how is your schooling?” he asked, his voice terse.
Pavel’s eyes widened as if a statue had suddenly come to life at the table. “How is my schooling?” he repeated carefully. “It’s cool, I guess. I’m still behind in math. But Mama’s a good tutor. She’s been helping me.”
“Good,” Nikolai said. The one word landed like a stone in the middle of the table, and he looked from side to side, having no idea what to say next.
But then Pavel asked, “Were you good at math when you was in school, Uncle?”
“’Were in school’, Pavel,” corrected Samantha from the other side of the table.
“Were you good at math when you were in school, Uncle?” Pavel repeated dutifully.
Nikolai answered with a slight shrug. “When I was your age I was already on hockey team. Maybe it did not matter so much how good I am with numbers.”
Pavel gaped at him. “You and my dad was-,” he darted a guilty look at Samantha, “I mean, you and my dad were already playing hockey when you were my age? Like professionally?”
“No, not as professional, but maybe, how you say, potential to become professional. Our coaches put us on path to become star hockey players. Math was not so important.”
HER RUSSIAN SURRENDER Page 17